Catannia Von Silas
Lady Catannia Von Silas, A.K.A. Lady Blackdagger is an Alterac Noble and the sole living member of a family that was raided by the Syndicate when she was just 13 years old. As the Syndicate bandits murdered her parents and stole the entire estate, they kidnapped the young Catannia, since their leader, Lord Barth Blackdagger desired her exotic features, and took her to be his "wife". Thus, Lady Catannia became known as "Lady Blackdagger", the "woman" of the leader of a Syndicate faction that looted and pillaged Alerac, Arathi, and beyond. While she was not a criminal at heart, she was forced to participate in many of their evil deeds, much to her loathing. She was captured by the Dominion of Alterac when the compound she was on was raided, and forced to stand trial in a Kangaroo Court that already predetermined that she was guilty of heinous crimes. Though little was known about her background, no one cared to look into the fact that she had been, in fact, a captive of the Syndicate most of her life, and dreamed every day of freedom. While she was found guilty of only one charge (theft), the Dominion's hatred of the Syndicate caused them to deal harshly with her. While they could not longer impose the death penatly as they wanted to, they sentenced her to murdering 100 Syndicate members - something that horrified her and, rather than freeing her, entrapped her all over again and dashed her hopes of ever having a normal life. Description Lady Blackdagger is a wounded, split individual who no longer knows who she is. Now 23, she is a far cry from the Lady Catannia Von Silas she used to be, although at her core, that identity still exists and wishes to thrive. The frilly dresses of her childhood are replaced with black leather and silk, and her sparkling hazel eyes, glazed over long ago. The happy, impish smile replaced with a look of angry defiance. Her form is petite, her eyes and golden-brown hair framing exotic features that caused the leader of the Syndicate compound to keep her for himself. She would be pretty, if it were not for the persistent depression that caused her features to be drawn into a mask of mistrust and hopelessness. The fact that she hardly eats or sleeps properly have left her pale and frail looking. She is easily hurt, since she lacks the health and strength to defend herself, and she no longer cares. Childhood Born to Lord Erich and Lady Nadia Von Silas on the family's Alteraci estate, young Lady Catannia was a much doted-on, only child. Her father called her "Cat", and then "Kitty". To this day, she remembers being called by that name, although she's never met a person since, who would love her enough that she would tell them her favorite nickname. Childhood days for Kitty were full of schooling, and lessons in the finer arts of being a "Lady". Kitty's parents taught by example, and the way they often reached out to the peasants around them with assistance, was something the young girl wanted to emulate. Sadly, she never got that chance. It was a beautiful spring day in Alterac when the snow was finally beginning to recede back to the mountains, when 13 year old Kitty was outside reading her favorite book in the swinging chair that hung from a huge tree in their front yard. She didn't see or hear, the rogue that suddenly clapped a hand over her mouth and pulled the young girl off the swing, but soon after she heard the yells and screams of the servants, and of her mother and father. Within ten minutes, it was all over. Her family and household lay in pools of their own blood all over the estate, and the Syndicate, whooping and hollering over their conquest, began to plunder the spoils. Young Catannia was bound hand and foot, gagged and blindfolded, and placed in the back of a wagon. Hours later, she would arrive, terrified and crying, to the home of her new master, Lord Barth Blackdagger, the leader of the Syndicate group that had just stolen everything from her. The following days were terrifying for her, and, because she was now the property of Lord blackdagger, she grew up fast.... far too fast... within days she was beaten and broken, her innocence stolen - compounded with the traumatic loss of her family and home, the young girl was practically catatonic. She cowered in a corner and would not move, or eat, or make eye contact with anyone. Frustrated that his young beauty was likely going to starve herself to death, Lord Blackdagger called for Nadia, a grandmotherly sort who tended to the ladies of the compound, to take her under her wing. The older woman was rough around the edges - a portly dwarf with a 5 o'clock shadow who smoked snakeroot cigars - but she was a motherly sort all the same. She alone managed to coax Catannia out of her depression and have her eating again. But the damage had already been done - Cat no longer valued her life. Syndicate Lady Blackdagger Lady Blackdagger lay weeping on her bed. She had just given birth for the fifth time since she was taken captive by the Syndicate nine years ago.... and, for the fifth time, as the midwife cleaned her up, Lord Barth Blackdagger wrapped the newborn in a blanket and handed it over to his assistant. "This one will fetch 2000 at least. Now go". Catannia howled, reaching pathetically for her newborn, crying "No, don't take him please!" Her loud sobs could be heard all over the compound. Barth, the ever loving monster that he was, simply scolded her for being ridiculous. "I'm not having screaming babies around, here, I've told you. And babies are worth a lot of gold on the Black market. Besides.." he stood up and sneered at her. "If you'd stop getting yourself pregnant, this wouldn't happen." He then turned on his heel and walked away, conveniently forgetting the fact that he, only, was the cause of her being pregnant. He had stolen her from her parents when she was just 13 years old, and made her his "woman". She may as well have been his dog, for all the affection that would include, in fact, his dogs were treated better than she was. "I have to get out of here, Moira" she sobbed to the midwife, a plump, middle aged dwarf who was the only one to ever fuss over her. "Now, now, child... you know they'd catch you if you tried, and I shudder to think of how long it would take them to kill you, and you know they would" Moira patted her cheek. "Now lay still and I'll bring you some tea" and she bustled away as if tea would fix everything that was wrong in Catannia's life. The only thing that kept Cat from trying to escape the Syndicate compound was the fact that they did not just kill their defectors, they tortured them for days on end. Cat knew, that would be her horrible fate if she tried to leave, and the torture would be more severe for her simply because she was the personal property of the leader. For ten long years, Cat would live among the thieves and bandits of the Syndicate. Eventually she found herself doing things she loathed, simply to survive among them. She also fell victim to the syndrome that affects many who are kidnapped, she developed an affection for her captors, in the hopes that they would treat her better. By aligning herself with them, she hoped for better days, and a lifting of her persistent depression. Sometimes it worked, but mostly it didn't. And the things she found herself doing in order to survive, caused a self-loathing she could never shake. She never did learn to wield a weapon, they would never trust her with one. But they taught her the art of stealth and espionage, and she became their best spy. They would send her to estates they wished to raid, and she would stay on site for days, unseen, as she watched their daily routines and drew up plans for when a raid would be the safest for them to attempt. She hated that the families she watched, would all be dead within days, because of her. Watching the children innocently at play in their yards was the hardest for her, and the thing that caused her to hate herself the most was knowing that they, like her, would have their lives shattered and stolen. If not killed, then kidnapped and sold on the black market. It took years before she could stop crying herself to sleep over this one aspect of her job, that she was only doing to survive. If it was not for the prospect of torture, she would have gladly given her own life rather than destroy these little ones. Catannia's only hope, that she only dared to entertain once in a while, was that the Syndicate compound she lived in would be raided, and she would be freed, rather than killed on the spot. It was not ever likely to happen - she looked like a Syndicate now, dressed like one, and possessed more of their mannerisms than she cared to admit. Sometimes she despaired that she had lost the 'Noble' part of herself and was, through and through, a full fledged member of the Syndicate. but she knew deep in her heart, this was not who she was. Buried somewhere deep, was the young girl who loved to read, who would ride her pony for hours in the sunlit meadows, and who dreamed of growing up to be a true Lady like her mamma, and help people in need. Yes, she was still that person. But unless a miracle happened, she would die like a flower that was never shown the sunlight, and died before she was allowed to bloom. Dominion of Alterac - A freedom worse than death Catannia got her wish for a raid that would free her, but of course, things rarely happen in the ways we wish for. Catannia had been sent to scope out a farm that seemed to be worked by Gnolls. What she saw there, horrified her - the Gnolls were brutish taskmasters, using child Dwarves as slaves. The children, all various ages, were in shackles and chains as they labored in the fields under the hot sun. Catannia watched the farm for days, wondering what to do. She knew if she simply reported back to the Syndicate, the Gnolls - and the children, would be brutally murdered. And she knew she would not convince Darth Blackdagger to let the children go free - about 20 of them as far as she could count. After much deliberating, she waited until nightfall when the entire farm was asleep, and began to move stealthily among the children, sound asleep in one of the barns, and picked the locks on their shackles. As each one awoke to her setting them free, she whispered for them to go. One by one they snuck out into the moonless night, and gathered in the hedge of the nearby trees. Once they were all free, they left together - hopefully, to find their ways home. Now, Catannia had another problem: The Gnolls would awake and find the children missing, and would certainly hunt them down, and either kill them or drag them back. She had to deal with them. Since she had no weapons, her only recourse was to chain them up with the same chains the children were bound in. And so, one by one, she found the sleeping taskmasters, and with a good thump to the head, stunned them long enough to shackle them. The shackles, meant for smaller limbs, were tight and dug into their flesh, and as they awoke, they snarled in pain and outrage. Knowing they were immobilized, she slipped away and returned to tell Barth Blackdagger that the farm was ready for them to raid. She would explain the reasons for the Gnolls being in chains later, and face the consequences. As the bandits surrounded the farm, it was, of course, the easiest raid they had ever completed, thanks to the entire population of the farm being hog-tied by Catannia. She was a hero until they began to question the presence of the shackles, and she had to tell them about the enslaved children. Barth was outraged that she had set them free, but fortunately, upon learning that they were in fact nearly full-grown dwarves, meant they were not worth much on the black market, and so Catannia got off easy with a beating. The group decided to keep the Gnolls as slaves to work the farm, and even Catannia had to admit to herself that it gave her a bit of satisfaction to see the brutish Gnolls subject to a taste of their own savagery. A small contingent of the Syndicate group stayed at the farm to oversee the Gnolls until the harvest was complete, and had been there about two weeks when they were suddenly under siege and raided by the Dominion of Alterac. Catannia, terrified for her life, grabbed a dagger and stabbed at any of the intruders who tried to get near her. However it wasn't long before she, the weakest of her group, was subdued and taken prisoner by the Alteracis, and dragged off to one of their holding cells to await trial for treason, theft, and attempted murder. Catannia was treated roughly and with hatred during her prison stay. She realized they thought she was exactly like every other Syndicate, and she could hardly blame them - but she hoped that once her story was told, that these decent people would find it in their hearts to understand that she was in fact a captive, doing what she had to in order to survive. It bothered her that her judge and jury would be the same people who captured her, and hated all Syndicate -but was all she could hope for, even though the rumor was she was to be executed after a trial that was already guaranteed to find her guilty of heinous crimes. Thankfully, Catannia had a defender on her side that understood her plight, and presented it flawlessly before the court, and the Judge, Lord Reynalden himself, and jury, though hardly neutral and fair in their feelings toward her, were forced to concede that two of the three charges had to be dropped for lack of evidence. Nonetheless, Lord Reynalden's seething hatred came through in his judgement - that rather than suffer execution, she must pay back society by in turn, personally assassinating 100 Syndicate members. Catannia was devastated. She was a Noblewoman, not a killer. The idea of taking a life and having blood on her hands, let alone 100 lives, was beyond her comprehension. She pleaded for death instead, and was denied. She was ordered to the wardship of Anton Caerwyn, The Lord Chancellor of the Dominion of Alterac, and he would prepare her for her task and see that she carried it out. As Catannia sank into a corner and wept over her fate, Anton was less than sympathetic. "Self pity will not help you" he hissed as he stood over her. When she did not stop crying, he left her. Hours later, a dry-eyed Catannia obediently reported to Lord Anton with a glazed look on her face. Lord Anton wasted no time in "teaching her" to kill, however, his methods were brutal and she, weighing barely more than a child, was unable to defend herself. She suffered a beating at his hand that left her with a broken rib - and the feeling that this was no better than suffering under her previous master. After being healed by Lord Anton's attendant, Catannia dragged herself off to a corner, feeling even more trapped and depressed than before. Justice and Exile Lord Reynaldin, bowing to pressure from the non-nobles who felt that Catannia's sentence was too harsh, gained information from her that led to a successful raid on the Syndicate encampment where Cat had lived with Barth Blackdagger. The Alteraci's were able to kill scores of Syndicate members and take one special hostage - Darth Blackdagger, himself. Since Catannia had assisted in the success of the raid by giving them information, Reynalden decided to release her to exile in Quel'Athillien for her own protection, concerned that if she stayed in Alterac, she'd be a mark for the Syndicate. The Dominion fighters had also managed to free a group of children whom they found in one of the buildings on the Syndicate compound. Since they did not know who the children belonged to and they suspected they were kidnap vicims, they brough them back to Alterac for Catannia to identify. Cat was only able to identify one child as possibly being hers, a young girl of about four years of age, who resembled Blackdagger with her jet black hair. If the child was in fact one of hers, it would have been the fourth child she bore while in the Syndicate, whom she assumed had been sold on the black market. It was possible, that since this was the only girl she had borne, that Blackdagger had kept her for himself rather than sell her like the other babies, who were all boys. Lord Reynalden invited Catannia to take the girl and raise her as her own. And so, with young Moira in tow, Catannia left Alterac, the only land she knew, and headed for her exile. She changed her appearance and discarded the Syndicate black leather uniform, and replaced it with silk robes to remind herself that she was, once, a Lady of Noble birth. Category:Dominion of Alterac Category:Alterac Peerage Category:Alteraci Category:Characters Category:Human